brokedown tro-tro and an armed robbery

In Ghana, a week seems like a month. I cannot believe that I have only been here for two and a half weeks. I have adjusted pretty well, I think, to the time, the food, the heat, the excessive sweating, and the general daily life here. But, I am still not used to the pace. Slowly, slowly. Everything happens slowly.

Over the past week, many things have happened. Last Friday we did not have school, as "cleaning week" was still in effect. It made for a nice long weekend. On Saturday the four of us decided to hit the road. Katy has a friend in Texas who works with a man from Ghana. His wife is here in Ghana and recently had a baby. Katy had money and clothes to deliver to his wife, Beatrice. Originially, we thought she was in Kumasi, which is two hours from Ejura. It turned out that she was in Sunyani, which was another two hours from Kumasi. We planned to go straight to Sunyani, visit Beatrice and the baby, then go directly back to Kumasi and get lunch/dinner at a restaurant called Vic Baboo's, which serves Western food - we were all dreaming of hamburgers and pizza. At 8 am we departed Ejura. We arrived at Beatrice's at about 1 pm. The baby was adorable...only one week old. We all held him and took pictures. We didn't stay long, though, as the hamburgers were calling us. We took a taxi back to the tro-tro station, where we had to wait over an hour for the tro-tro to fill up. Meanwhile, I had the best Sprite I had ever tasted, Katy learned to peel and orange with a machete, and a man selling necklackes proposed to me, saying, "I will marriage you." He had to repeat himself about 10 times before I understood what he was saying and when I finally got it, I laughed out loud. I think he was offended and asked why I was laughing. Katy informed him that in America we ASK someone to marry us, not TELL them. I politely declined.

We made it back to Kumasi and it was dumping rain, but we were determined to make it to Vic Baboo's. We took shelter in a small store and grabbed a taxi to the restaurant. Unfortunately, I think all the driver understood was "restaurant," and he dropped us off at some hotel that served all the local fare. We were starving, but couldn't deal with the idea of more rice, so we started asking if anyone knew where Vic Baboo's was. A nice police officer couple offered us a ride and dropped us off. We walked in and noticed it was full of white people. A strange sight, indeed! We ordered a pizza to share and hamburgers all around. Even though by American standards, it wasn't that good, in Africa it was delicious! We finished around 7 pm and headed to the station and eventually found the tro-tro back to Ejura. We knew things were bad when the tro-tro died as it was pulling out of the station. Long story short, it died four more times on the way home and the normally two hour ride took five hours. At one point, we were all standing on the side of the road in the middle of a village with no electricity. It did make for good stargazing. We got home around 1 am.

School officially started on Monday. I have to say...it didn't take long for my American classroom to look....amazing!!! I am learning patience, for sure! Right now I am teaching social studies to JSS 1 and JSS 2 (equivalent to about 7th and 8th grade). There are seven periods a day and I am teaching one or two a day. I feel like I'm an observer in college again. I'm not teaching the JSS 3 class, as it is a more "serious" class and they have exams in April. I did teach them the first day; however, as their teacher did not show up. They impressed me by asking if I would speak to the headmaster to see if they could start sleeping at the school in order to maximize their study time, as their homes aren't so conducive to studying. From what I've observed, there is a lot of reading from the book and the teacher talking. The classrooms are pretty sparse...desks and a chalkboard. I am trying to be patient...I will be talking to the headmaster this next week to increase my class load. The kids are great though...I am enjoying getting to know them.

A funny story: around 4:00 on Tuesday morning I was awakened by some rustling sounds in my room. This was normal as there is constant noise in Africa. I glanced across the room and noticed light shining into the room. This was not normal as there are thick wood shutters on the windows that we close and lock each night. Then, I saw a hand coming in through the window and reaching for items on my desk. The arm wasn't coming through the entire window, as there are horizontal bars accross it and it is entirely screened in except for a 6" x 6" opening at the bottom that has a wood panel that slides up so you can reach the lock from inside the room. The "armed" robber was somehow able to unlock the bottom of the shutters and slide the wood panel up to reach his arm in. Of course, I freaked out and yelled, "No! Get Away!!!" I scared both the robber and my roommate, Maaike. Luckily, nothing was stolen, as the boys had already warned us this could happen and my desk was clear of anything valuable and smaller than 6" x 6". I've moved my desk away from the window and we make sure to lock the top and bottom of the shutters.

I have a new phone number now. I had to switch to a different network, as the one I had didn't have good coverage. If you want to call, my number is 011-233-24-516-8973.

The hooligans have been hanging around daily, but both Cappy and Mo'Naughty are better behaved now. Cappy even calls himself Cappy. He is still obnoxious, though. The other day he told me, "You have the hair of a bug. You have the mouth of a mango. You look like a monkey. And you are a fool." I thought it was a nice little poem until he said I am a fool. I didn't get too mad, though, as he was wearing a lavender shirt that had an acrostic poem of "perfect" on it and P stood for Princess. =)

My tree-farmer admirer has not returned, although Mahadev said he stopped by last Saturday and was going to come back and bring me some yams. This leads me to believe, indeed, that he was only interested in debating the property issues with Dada. It's ok with me, though, as I don't really like yams.

Speaking of food, it is good, if you only had to eat it once or twice. Everyday is too much. We have rice or spaghetti noodles as every meal. I have tried a variety of new foods, though, including fufu, which is about the consistency of raw bread dough, with zero flavor. Banku is not so good - it is made of fermented cornmeal and is the consistency of partially cooked bread dough. My favorite is fresh coconut and fresh sqeezed orange juice. We've tried boiled peanuts, sugarcane, kenkey, fried yams, plantains...I think I might be losing some weight, though surely the abundance of carbs makes it more difficult.

Which, by the way...white people are rare in Ghana, as are overweight people. So...to be an overweight white person is doubly special. "Obolo" means fat...so everywhere I go I am either called "obruni" or "obolo." Luckily, people are nice and I THINK it is meant as an affectionate term. Nonetheless, it does get annoying. I try to teach everyone my name, instead...and it's helped. Whenever we walk to town, I hear choirs of "Sarah..." My name seems to be the easiest to pronouce and remember, so it is my name the children yell.

I think that is all for now. Thanks again for all your emails. I enjoy reading them and will try to respond to as many as I can today. I miss you all!!!

P.S. I have started reading "Pride and Prejudice." I know, it may be hard for some of you to believe...I am reading a book. That is how you know that I am in need of entertainment. OH - and one more thing - I can't believe I forgot to tell you: Last night was movie night. We watched an African movie (at the boys' request - we all wanted to watch "I am SAM") entitled, "DADA BA." Basically it was about this guy who was too old to be living at home and he was a "playa." He got all the ladies. I went to bed early and missed most of the movie. But...I did get to see the dinner date scene that was set to a Celine Dion song. Seriously. I have never laughed so hard in my life.

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